1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a handwritten character recognition and qualification and more particularly to implementation of handwriting recognition and qualification within a pedagogical reading and writing system implemented on a multi-media personal computer.
2. Description of the Problem
The Orton-Gillingham Approach, as outlined by the International Dyslexia Association (formerly the Orton Dyslexia Society) includes eight essential instructional elements. The elements are: (1) Multisensory--instruction involving the immediate, intensive, and continuous interaction between what the student is seeing, hearing, and feeling in the speech mechanisms and the writing hand. All the language elements taught are reinforced by having the student listen, speak, read and write; (2) Alphabetic/Phonetic--sound-symbol associations along with linguistic rules and generalizations are introduced in a linguistically logical, understandable order. The essence of the phonetic approach is to make letter-to-sound connections as simple and comprehensive as possible; (3) Synthetic/Analytic--the student is taught how to blend sounds together; (4) Structured--the student learns one sound association, linguistic rule, or nonphonetic word and practices using it with previously taught material until it is secure before learning the next piece; (5) Sequenced--linguistic concepts are taught in a sequence which will minimize potentially confusing elements; (6) Cumulative--the student should be asked to use each newly introduced element while reinforcing others that have been taught; (7) Repetitive--the concepts are repeated until the student gains mastery; (8) Cognitive--the student should understand the "linguistic logic" underlying word formations and patterns and be able to demonstrate that understanding while writing words.
Implementation of an automated, student-responsive tutoring program using the Orton-Gillingham approach requires implementation of a handwritten-character recognition engine. Many patents deal with handwriting analysis programs which identify characters. Some of the features of these documents are usable with an automated implementation of the Orton-Gillingham approach, e.g. light pens and scanned writing tablets (i.e. some sort of digitizer pad) and apparatus for the immediate redisplay of what has been written. U.S. Pat. No. 5,121,442 to Togawa et al. is a representative teaching of these sorts of features.
However, existing handwriting recognition engines emphasize identification of a letter rather than qualifying the handwritten characters against normative standards. Nor are the prior art references known to the present inventor directed to meeting corrective demands of a pedagogical system. The problem is not one of training the computer to read whatever students write, nor of training students to write so that the computer can identify what they have written; rather it is one of training students, particularly students with particular learning disabilities, to read and write, and to that end, to hand-write in consistent and kinesthetically unambiguous ways. To accomplish this, the handwriting recognition engine must produce data by which the progress of the student may be quantified and guide the student toward correcting his or her handwriting.
What is needed is a letter (or phonic character) stroke analysis and appearance qualification engine which can both recognize the letter formed and evaluate the quality of the letter in terms both of its final appearance as well as how it was constructed.